216 :: FeiìGIVENESS OF SIId. but the retarding of the cure of his child for a season : for our Savior holds him off until he had instructed him on this point: "If thou canst believe, all things are possible unto him that believeth." Mistake not, if thy child be not cured, it is not for want of power or pity in me, but of faith in thee. My power is such as ren- ders all things possible. So it is with many who would he made partakers of forgiveness: if it be possible, they would be pardoned, but they do not see it possible. Why, where is the de- fect'? God hath no pardon for them, or such as they are; and so it may be they will finally come short of pardon. What, because it is not possible with God -to pardon them ? Not at all ; but because they cannot, they will not believe that the forgiveness which is with him is such that it would answer all the wants of their souls. God is dishonored when he is limited by us in any thing, and most of all in his grace. This he calls -a tempting of him, a provoking temp- tation, " They turned back and tempted God, they limited the Holy One of Israel." Psalm 78 : 41. This he could not bear with. If there be any pardon with God, it is such as becomes him to give: when he par - dons, he will "abundantly pardon." Go with your limited, conditional pardons, with reserves and limita- tions to the sons of men; it may become them, it is like themselves: that of God is absolute and perfect, before which our sins are as a cloud before the rising sun. Hence he is said to do this work with his whole heart and his whole soul ; " ch,arizesthai,"freely, bounti- fully, largely to indulge and forgive unto us our sins, and to cast them into the bottom of the sea, Micah, 7 : 19, into a bottomless ocean, an emblem of infinite mercy. Remember this, poor souls, when you come to God for forgiveness : all things are possible to them that believe.
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